Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
10:00-18:00, Thu until 22:00, closed Mon; same hours for Altes Museum except closes Thu
at 20:00. Tel. 030/266-424-242,
www.smb.museum
.
Required Reservation for Pergamon and Neues Museums:
Visiting either the Per-
gamon Museum or Neues Museum requires a
Zeitfensterticket
(“time-window ticket”) that
gives you a 30-minute time slot for entering the museum (included with admission; separate
appointments required for each museum). Once inside, you can stay as long as you like.
Reserve your time online (
www.smb.museum
)
or in person at any Museum Island ticket of-
fice. (At less busy times, tickets are sometimes sold without any particular time slot.)
You can usually get a time slot within about an hour, often sooner—except at the busiest
times (Sat and Sun mornings), when you may have to wait longer. The least-crowded times
are evenings when the museums are open late (Thu for Pergamon, Thu-Sat for Neues).
Buying Tickets:
The temporary kiosk on Bodestrasse functions as the ticket booth for
the Neues Museum and comes with avoidable lines. Long ticket-buying lines also plague
the Pergamon Museum. Avoid them by purchasing your museum pass (and getting your as-
signed entry time) at one of the island's three never-crowded museums: Altes, Bode, or Old
National Gallery. (From Unter den Linden, Altes is most convenient; if coming from Pren-
zlauer Berg, try the Bode.)
Planning Your Time:
I'd start at the Bode, where I'd ask for an entry time to the Per-
gamon Museum in about an hour, and a ticket to the Neues Museum for 1.5 hours after
that. Tickets and appointments in hand, spend any time left before your Pergamon time slot
browsing the Bode. Then enjoy the Pergamon collection, where the art is earth-shaking but
easy to see in an hour. If you have any extra time before your Neues appointment, nip in-
to the time-tunnel Old National Gallery. Step into the Neues Museum within 30 minutes of
your entry time, and be prepared to linger. I'd skip the Altes Museum. For lunch nearby,
follow the elevated train tracks away from the Pergamon down Georgenstrasse (see recom-
Getting There:
The nearest S-Bahn station is Hackescher Markt, about a 10-minute
walkaway.FromhotelsinthePrenzlauerBerg,ridetram#M-1totheendofline,andyou're
right at the Pergamon Museum.
The star attraction of this world-class museum, part of Berlin's Collection of Classical
Antiquities(Antikensammlung),isthefantasticandgiganticPergamonAltar.TheBabyloni-
an Ishtar Gate (slathered with glazed blue tiles from the 6th century
B.C.
) and the museum's
many ancient Greek, Mesopotamian, Roman, and early Islamic treasures are also impress-
ive.
